


dream state

by nonbinarysunset



Series: that which binds [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Finn-centric (Star Wars), Force Visions, Force-Sensitive Finn (Star Wars), Gen, POV Finn (Star Wars), Post-Star Wars: The Force Awakens
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-21
Updated: 2020-03-21
Packaged: 2021-02-28 19:42:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,089
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23242714
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nonbinarysunset/pseuds/nonbinarysunset
Summary: As Finn's body fights to heal itself after the fight on Ilum, he tries to understand what's really under the surface of the altercation. Kylo appears, and offers very little information, but Finn gets what he needs.-a vision/dream finn has while he's healing in his coma between TFA and TLJ.
Relationships: Finn & Kylo Ren
Series: that which binds [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1671142
Comments: 2
Kudos: 20





	dream state

The battle echoes in Finn's head as his consciousness swirls around him in the darkness. He can hear Kylo Ren shouting at him, voice raw and broken.

_ “Traitor!” _

The hum of the crossguard saber is low, but Finn hears it as clearly as the pounding of his heart. 

_ ”That lightsaber – it belongs to me.” _ He says next, and there’s a leading tone in it, like Ren hopes Finn might toss it to him at the news, like the mention of the Skywalker bloodline should sway his choice to rival him. 

Instead, Finn rises to his feet, Skywalker saber grasped firmly in his hands, and stands his ground as the blue beam warms his cheeks. He chose to leave the first order, he chose to help the resistance. He knows what he stands for, and he’d sooner die than let Ren win. 

_ “Come get it.” _

Something changes then. Everything moves much faster than it had the first time around. The battle flashes before Finn’s eyes at lightning speed and there’s a vibration in his bones every time they swing at each other. From somewhere, outside of the blurred fight on Ilum, Kylo comes into view. He looks different, but not very. 

His cloak is gone. The whole top of his dramatic outfit is gone. He’s damp with sweat, but not dripping, so he’s at least attempted to clean himself up. Even so, there are still pine needles stuck in his unkempt hair. The sight of him is revolting. What makes it bearable is the display of how harshly the battle had affected Kylo, bleeding from his face and chest.

_ Good _ , Finn thinks to himself. 

He’s not the only one who hears it. Kylo Ren turns his head, locking eyes with Finn. It’s not clear what –  _ if _ – he’s thinking or feeling. He always looks upset by something.

“Traitor,” he greets, and Finn simmers. At least it’s not a number. “You’re still alive.”

Well, that’s nice to know. He’s been starting to wonder if he was stuck in a loop of his last, awful moment. 

Finn’s own face contorts the longer he examines Kylo's undisguised face. He’s just … a man. Under all the black fabric and the scary mask he was a man like any other, not a creature that crawled its way through the core of a planet to ruin the galaxy. 

“Must be embarrassing for you. Master of the Knights of Ren, and you couldn’t kill one man.”  _ A novice to the lightsaber, no less, _ Finn says, only to himself this time. He’s a skilled fighter in his own right – with any weapon – and lightsabers aren’t as difficult to handle as Kylo makes it seem. But Finn would never short change his own ability for the likes of Kylo Ren. He  _ will _ never. 

Kylo smiles, and it separates his face in a way Finn hopes never to see again. “I wasn’t trying to kill you,” he exasperates. “I was going to take you back with me.”

Finn almost laughs, but he’s too distracted by the waver in Kylo’s voice. Kylo knew it was a faulty plan. At any rate, Finn would rather die of exposure and the severity of his wounds in Ilum’s forest than return to the First Order. “I would have been interrogated for information on the Resistance, and then executed for treason.”

“Why did you leave?”

Finn feels something very similar to pain, and around the two of them, unfocused memories of anguish rushed by. Some are Finn’s – he recognizes the voices, the sound of armor plates crashing against each other – and some clearly belong to someone else – likely Kylo, although Finn couldn’t get himself to find any compassion in his heart for a monster like Ren.

Every moment within the First Order was the worst moment of Finn’s life. The day he set foot on Jakku, though virtually the same as any other day, made his bones scream. He looked at the destruction he had been ordered to participate in, saw and heard and felt the agony that it caused, watched Slip’s life crash to a halt, and knew he had to get out. He wouldn’t suffer every day and die in the service of those who abducted him and would subjugate the entire galaxy if there was another way – and there  _ had _ to be another way. 

“There was no other way,” he says. “I had to leave.” Finn thinks the Force would sooner have stopped his heart while he slept than allow him to spend one more day in that wretched institution.

“So you think,” Kylo mumbles, lip twitching. 

In the haze that surrounds them, Finn can see a massive figure that could only be Kylo, and someone else – he can’t make out who it is. He can’t hear what they’re saying, but he knows they’re talking about him. Something in the way the blurred Kylo’s posture changes, and Finn recognizes the shift in energy he felt on Jakku. That someone is aware of him, hyper-focused in a way he can sense through any layer of armor. He doesn’t like it. 

“Enough.” Finn isn’t sure how, but that dispels the vision, and it’s just him in the vague darkness with Kylo again. 

“I had my eye on you. Not for long before you walked, but I did. You were too great to go unnoticed. It would have been a waste to leave you in a sea of expendable troopers.”

“Lives are not expendable.”

Kylo manages to roll his eyes without moving a muscle. “That’s not the point.”

“It’s  _ my _ point.” The words echo throughout the space like they're trapped at the bottom of a well. The lives of the troopers were not their own, and the lives of everyone else in a galaxy tormented by the First Order are not their own. “What you want and what I want would never have aligned. You’re mad if you thought otherwise.” 

At the hardening of his face, Kylo’s form begins to shake violently, but he doesn’t seem to be moving. He begins to disappear, phasing out of reality like he was never there to begin with. Finn can tell how much work it’s taking for Kylo to get his final words in. “You don’t know what I want.”

And he’s right. In the few words he’d spoken, Kylo never explained the motive behind any of his anger.

“It doesn’t matter,” Finn shouts. He feels their connection draw to a close. Before he can finish, Kylo blurs out of existence. He says it anyway. “I’ve made my choice.”

**Author's Note:**

> this is a small part of a much larger story I have reworked for the sequel trilogy, since lucasfilm is allergic to giving finn ample storytime. if you have any questions or want to know more, just ask.


End file.
